Stitching together a crazy sys admin world with Python

Quiltwork

The Fabric Python library makes it extremely easy to create repeatable scripts of commands over SSH to any number of servers.

Fabric [1] is an amazing Python library that makes it easy to codify common system tasks into flexible recipes. Chef and Puppet are great tools for larger, more complicated environments, but they are often a lot of work for more simple setups. Anytime I find myself executing a series of commands together on a regular basis, I switch gears and build a Fabric task instead.

Starting a script on a Linux server with just a few mouse clicks sounds more complicated than it really is. If you want to create attractive and interactive dialogs for your desktop users, all you need is a small utility called SSH and a little Bash know-how.